


Headrest for my Soul

by duckhyuck



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Anxiety, Depression, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-04-06
Packaged: 2018-10-15 07:38:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10552564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duckhyuck/pseuds/duckhyuck
Summary: There's a leak in this boat, how the hell will I float?





	

**Author's Note:**

> I have a long update for My Somebody is a Nobody coming soon, for those of you waiting I'm so sorry I haven't been...great.
> 
> I've been depressed, 95% of this story is just events in my life just substituting myself with Mark. So yay for using a fan fic to cope!

The faucet drips. _Drip drop, drip...drop, drip drop, drip...drop._ A melancholy tune it is and it resonates deep within his mind. It’s a soft rhythm, which would be flattering if it were accompanied by swift and elegant movements.

Mark’s chest rises and falls, his eyes mimicking the leaky tap. Alternating between the right and the left, a single tear each time, slips down his cheek. Sadness but where is the cause? The cheery orange curtains surely have done no harm to the warmth of the room. The pastel brown walls swarmed in posters, musicians that spark inspiration in a youthful mind; surely they too have attacked no border in the young boy’s head. That leaves the ceiling...ah yes...it’s a separate entity all on its own because when the body stills upon its back the open eyes will be graced with the starch, unsettling white of the world above.

Mark brings no hand up to wipe away the blur, sacrificing clarity because of unjustifiable fatigue. He thinks about things, silly things. _This is what depressed people do; they lie down and stare at the ceiling. Do I really need to lie here to prove a point, especially when my math homework is itching to be touched? No I absolutely have to lay here or else who’ll believe me. Who’ll believe that my mind has become the puddle of wasted water spilling from the tap? Who will believe me if I don’t fit that image, that disgusting image they’ve made in their minds because if I don’t then no doubt my only support will be a sympathetic smile._

 

There’s a knock at Mark’s bedroom door. It’s a double tap, the first knock softer than the second, conclusion, his mother.

The door swings open; a gust of the inside outside world comes bellowing into the tiny room. Mark’s eyes leave the stars and find his mother’s tired, irked ones. The woman sits on the crumpled blue and orange comforter.

“Why are you just lying here?” Her voice is passive.

Mark shrugs.

“You need to speak to me,” the irritation pools into her tone.

“I don’t know,” Mark whispers.

“You’re sad, are you not?”

Mark nods.

“Well something has to be making you sad. School? Family? Friends?”

Mark shakes his head to each because this isn’t the right time. His defences are up, his words are down as soon as a slip of annoyance graced his mother. He bites down hard on his tongue, blocks off his thoughts.

A sigh of frustration passes through his mother’s lips. She rises to her feet, the bed un-dips back into its original form. Here presence is gone with the click of the door.

Mark wishes he could have said yes to all three she had listed.

 

^^^<<<>>>^^^

 

The red fifty-five taunts him like a finger curling, beckoning him closer into the pits of hell. Congratulations Mark Lee, six percent away from failing completely. Passing by the scrape of his skin floods his mouth with a bitter taste, the absolute fail would have been more satisfying than this.

“How’d you do?”

Climbing out from the void he’s thrown himself into, Mark is greeted with Donghyuck’s curious smile. He looks the other up and down then laughs nervously.

“Dude I totally wanna die,” He shows the mark to the other.

Donghyuck gives a small chuckle, “Don’t worry about it man, you’ll bounce back.” His hand curls around Mark’s shoulder.

Generally Mark has no hatred towards physical contact but there’s something so offending when comfort comes from those who’ve done a million times better than you. His body shutters, he force cools the simmering white hot rage and the vile urge to slap Donghyuck’s hand away. He covers his pain in a weak smile, “Yeah next time, I’ll get it right.”

 

^^^<<<>>>^^^

 

_“Dude I totally wanna die”_

It echoes in the back of his brain. It’s so easy to joke about because in a way it’s getting somewhat of the truth out there...right?

“I’m afraid of death,” Mark mutters under his breath. He watches the rain glide down his window. _In the end maybe raindrops are afraid too, afraid of returning to a cloud in the sky which is not its origin._

“Mark?”

“Hmm?”

“Are you feeling okay?”

“No.”

Silence.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“I don’t want to _talk_ , Donghyuck,” _I don’t wanna feel,_ “I want to study.”

“Mark I’ve been asking you about the same equation for the past twenty minutes, you’ve stared at the weather for ten of those.”

“I’m sorry.”

Mark’s sitting on the edge of his bed; his legs become encircled within Donghyuck’s arms, as the younger is situated on the floor. He takes the action as secret speech for: “please don’t apologize.”

 

^^^<<<>>>^^^

 

“Spend time with your grandfather, he won’t be around forever.”

Mark gets up in a huff. He’s heard those words come from his mother before. Yet she doesn’t understand how they pulverize him every time.

His sight clouds over. The real problem is his grandfather hasn’t been around lately. He died a long time ago when that disease devoured his feeble mind. It was a funeral when Mark looked the elder dead in the eye and listened to how he was referred to as mystery kid because his face was no longer recognizable to the old man.

The seventy year old lives like a three year old. He has no concept of time, bizarre appetite and  struggles with sleep. He is not Mark’s grandfather. He is not the man that walked Mark to the playground, pushed him on the swing and took his hand in his own. He is not the man that taught him Euchre, or the man that came to his hockey games, smiling when Mark performed well.

The crippled old man hunched over in the rocking chair is not Mark’s grandfather, Mark spent his time with him, what’s left is a corpse that he has mentally buried.

_Don’t tell me what to do. Don’t speak of things so easily. I refuse to play with ghosts._

^^^<<<>>>^^^

 

Soft lips touch Mark’s forehead and air rapidly fills his lungs.

“You’ve done enough, you’re doing enough. Mark you’re enough.”

Mark shakes but the firm hold on his limp body keeps him from crumbling to pieces.

“Donghyuck,” Mark’s voice breaks into a whimper, “This isn’t real is it.”

“No.”

Mark looks at his hands, and his falling tears pass through his palms and hit the floor. “I’m dreaming?”

“Seems so...

Mark cringes. “Please tell me one more time, let me have this even if...even if it’s all fake.”

“Even if this isn’t reality, what I say isn’t fake Mark.”

Soft lips press upon his and a thumb rubs away the tears. Thick and black in colour they ooze from his eyes. The pressure on his mouth draws back.

“Mark you’re enough.”

 

That’s all he ever wanted to believe.

 

^^^<<<>>>^^^

 

6:45am

_It’s Tuesday, wake up Mark. Wake up, wake up and live._

_I don’t want to live, if this is what living is like. I know the answers to my unsolvable problems, I know the harshness of the world I am not naive. I know it all. My future is a collapsing concept._

_I know that I don’t want to live._

_Not like this, because this isn’t living._


End file.
